Smith was already on his third team when he joined the Panthers, but he made a big impression with the Cats. He generated a career-high with 25 goals, and maybe most importantly, wowed with eight points in six playoff contests.

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) A chancellor will rule within the week on whether a co-owner of the Nashville Predators can keep his lawsuit against the team’s ownership group in a Tennessee court or have to submit to arbitration.

Chancellor Ellen Hobbs Lyle heard nearly three hours of arguments Wednesday on a motion that would force David Freeman out of her court and back into arbitration with NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman.

Freeman, a former team chairman, sued Predators Holdings LLC and current team chairman Tom Cigarran on June 23 and is seeking $250 million in damages for his original 48 percent stake in the team being diluted.

The lawsuit states that Freeman, through Commodore Trust, organized the Holdings investment group in 2007 to keep the Predators in Nashville. But it charges that some Holdings members “have conspired to repay his dedication to the team and community by claiming that Commodore owns less than one percent of Holdings.”

The lawsuit also states that members of the Predators ownership group have refused to treat Commodore Trust as an owner and have repudiated Holdings’ “commitment to compensate plaintiffs in return for tens of millions of dollars of loan guarantees that kept the Predators solvent and in Nashville.”

The complaint names Cigarran “the chief architect of this scheme.”

Freeman has been involved in other NHL arbitration cases over the past year, but the lawsuit argues that Bettman cannot be impartial because he has an obligation to protect the league.

At Wednesday’s hearing, attorneys for Freeman and Commodore Trust – which is also a plaintiff in the lawsuit – argued that league rules are so overly broad that they wrongly could allow the commissioner to arbitrate this case. They also argued Freeman is technically not a co-owner of the team but rather an investor in a trust whose business dispute should not be decided by the commissioner.

Lawyers for both Predators Holdings and the NHL defended the commissioner’s impartiality and the league’s constitution, which gives Bettman the right to handle disagreements among both clubs and owners through arbitration. They also said Freeman agreed to arbitration when he signed consent agreements as part of buying the Predators in December 2007.

Seems a little harsh for the Rangers, even if it’s reasonable to criticize their direction. Is this regular playoff contender really doing worse than the teams that immediately follow them in Columbus (4.31) and Colorado (4.37)?

That’s the fun thing about lists like these, though.

The Tampa Bay Lightning clocked in at No. 1, although apparently GM Steve Yzerman still believes he has work to do.

While the Rangers are interestingly low, the Panthers’ polarizing off-season seems more like a smash-hit on this list; they’re ranked No. 2 behind the Lightning, besting the Penguins (who come in at fourth after winning the Stanley Cup).

There are some remarkable steps up and down in perception on this list, particularly when you consider things like the changing viewpoints on the league’s three California teams.

Corey Crawford ranks as one of the most established goalies in the NHL, so it’s bewildering to consider how many times he could have gone down a different path.

CSNChicago.com points to an interesting “What if?” scenario early in his career, as Crawford admitted that he considered leaving the NHL during early developmental struggles.

“I stayed pretty motivated most of the time, but obviously it’s hard to (be in the minors) for your entire career,” Crawford said during Saturday’s “My Path to the NHL” panel at the ninth annual Blackhawks Convention. “There were definitely times when I thought I’d might like to move on, maybe go play in Europe or go try and play in Russia if I could.”

Such a thought is a reminder that Crawford traveled a bumpy road to becoming the Chicago Blackhawks go-to goaltender.

Let’s take a look back at some of his ups and downs even as he finally became a fixture at the highest level.

2010-11

As mentioned before, he played in 57 games. Here’s something to jog your memory: he battled for playing time with Marty Turco.

(Yes, that really happened.)

The Vancouver Canucks ultimately bounced Crawford and the defending champion Blackhawks from the first round.

As much as that Stanley Cup run cemented Crawford’s status, this past season was just as effective in making his argument.

Chicago wasn’t quite as dominant, yet Crawford set a career-high with 35 wins and matched the nice .924 save percentage he generated in 2014-15. He played well enough that Kane considered him an All-Star snub.

***

Wow, quite a ride, right?

There were a few forks in the road for Crawford and the Blackhawks, but both parties must be glad that he stuck around.

With Tavares’ current hyper-bargain deal not expiring until after the 2017-18 season, that’s a situation that is pretty far off, but the New York Islanders’ new owners seem confident that they’ll avoid that sort of Stamkos drama.

As Lighthouse Hockey and others note, Jon Ledecky said that Tavares “isn’t becoming a free agent” during last weeks town hall meetings.

I asked John Ledeky outright if he will forever retain Tavares. He said they'll manage the cap well and he will always be an islander…

“We should be the world-class destination for free agents,” Ledecky said during the meeting. “If you think about a capped world, everybody can spend to the cap, and we certainly have no constraints on our GM and our staff to spend. We want to create and continue to progress toward John Tavares lifting that Stanley Cup, so we should be world-class in everything we do.”

Brooks’ piece is a fascinating peek into the challenges the two face in addressing fans on Long Island and in Brooklyn, noting that Ledecky emphasized that “We’re the New York Islanders.”

Retaining Tavares would be an enormous step in the direction of indeed becoming a world-class destination, and the Isles have time to back up their big words and surround their star with quality support.

If nothing else, Ledecky and Malkin seemed to make a world-class first impression.